Technology and English with Eda

Hey guys. I’m here with my final post.  I’m afraid it is farewell time. The term is coming to an end.  Photo taken from here Today I’m going to be reflecting my  philosophy statement I posted 2 months ago. I mentioned how technology has many benefits when used properly, especially for education. And my thoughts have not changed about this. But there is one thing that has changed about me, and that is how I use technology. I definitely don’t feel the same as I did 3-4 months ago, when the course started. Well, in the philosophy statement post, I said that I’m not so good with technology but I think I improved myself. Before this course I had no idea about RSS feed, digital story telling and I did not know anything about making a podcast, a padlet or even a magazine cover. I had never created a wiki entry. Photo taken from here In my opinion, this course has so many benefits. I not only learned to be more creative, I also developed my Engl...

Hello! I've created an infographic about 5 of my favorite web tools which should be used by all teachers and students. The website I used   to create the infographic. Hello! I've created an infographic about 5 of my favorite web tools which should be used by all teachers and students.  First of them is Edmodo which we are already using in three courses this term. On Edmodo, our teachers inform us about class schedules, projects, videos we are supposed to watch, etc. The second one is Grammarly. As I mentioned on the infographic, it helps the users to correct their mistakes when they are writing something. Students can use Grammarly to correct their spelling mistakes for their homework.  Kahoot! allows mostly teachers to create games or quizzes based on the topic of the lesson. And students can participate in the lesson with their mobile phones, computers or tablets. Padlet , as I mentioned in one of my previous posts, allows the teacher...

Hi everyone! Today my post is about RSS and some websites/blogs I’m currently following.  What is RSS? According to Wikipedia, RSS is a type of web feed which allows users and applications to access updates to online content in a format. Thanks to RSS, you can’t miss the latest posts from the websites you like.  Photo taken from here I tried to use the app “RSS Feed Reader” but it gave error when I tried to add some blogs to my feed. So my friend suggested me to use the Blogger’s own feeder that shows latest updates from these blogs.  You can see a screenshot of how I did it: You must "Add Gadget" and select "Blog List", then pick a title and add the website you wish to follow.  If you want to check out the websites I'm following, you can see them under the "About Me" section. I'm adding a screenshot of them: My favorite is Sandy Millin’s blog . Millin has so many posts on how to be a good teacher, how to use ...

Photo taken from here Hey everyone! Me and my friends, Deniz and Rana, have created a digital story about how to have a good relationship with teachers . Digital storytelling is basically about telling a story or giving information etc. with the help of technology. Firstly Deniz talked about making a good impression on teachers, secondly, my part was about maintaining good grades and finally Rana mentioned modeling good behaviour.  Photo taken from here While creating the digital story, it took some time to prepare and edit the video. Also adding both audio recordings and music was a bit hard; but we, mostly Deniz, managed to do it. We used Apple's Voice Recording App to record audio, Movie Maker  and  Adobe Premiere Clip   to create the video. It was an okay project, personally not my favorite but it was beneficial. It can help English learners to improve their speaking. You can check out my friends' blogs here: Ran...

Hi everyone! Today I'm posting a magazine cover that I've recently created for a project.  I designed a fictitious theme magazine about movies, TV shows and books. It is called " Entertainment Digest ". On the cover there are some topics which are included in the magazine. You can see issue number and the logo on the left corner. I personally liked this project but it takes a lot of time to prepare. I'm not sure if I would prefer to use this project in the future. Maybe after their exams students can create a magazine cover, since it improves imagination and is fun to do. Hope you like my cover! (I know I lack photo editing skills, sorry!)

Hey everyone! Today I will be evaluating an ELT webside called “one stop english”. You can visit the website from here . Photo taken from here Main Info About one stop english one stop english was created in order to help English learners and mainly English teachers. There are currently over 700,000 users in more than 100 countries around the world. You can subscribe for £42 for a year. It’s a teacher resource site, part of Macmillan Education which is one of the world’s leading publishers of English language teaching materials. Also resources are clearly marked by age and level. Unfortunately I couldn’t find any information about the founders of the website but I found out that Rachel Slatter is the managing editor and Erica is the development editor. I would’ve liked if they informed the visiters of the website about who founded it; however, there is detailed information about two editors, about what their duties and purposes are, what school they gradua...

Hi everyone, today’s post is about a padlet assignment for my Instructional Technologies and Materials Design in ELT course. Me and my 4 friends created a padlet about endangered animals on padlet.com , together. Every member of our group participated and I think the outcome is quite good. Photo taken from here We did our research on the information about endangered animals, causes of why they are endangered, possible solutions and we conducted a survey as well. I found some information about spesific species and shared a graph showing some species’ numbers. Creating a padlet was easy and useful; it helps the users to learn the information in an enjoyable way. You can write anything you want, share photos or videos, change the style of your padlet, etc. I used all of these methods and I didn’t find it difficult at all. I think it could and it should be used in the classrooms, mostly in the language classrooms. The learners, especially young learners, can...

Hi everyone! I created a wiki entry about one of my favorite books of 2019 so far, it is a thriller-mystery named  The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton.  I read it in January and fell in love with it.  The book is about Aiden Bishop who is trapped in different bodies but he lives the same day over and over again, also he is supposed to solve a murder mystery. If you’d like to read my opinions in detail, click here . A little note: As I love reading, this task -reviewing a book- has been my favorite!  Photo taken from here

Hello everyone, this is a new post about teaching with technology. I am supposed to write a philosophy statement for a task for my Instrucional Technologies and Materials Design in ELT course. Photo taken from here We are in the 21 st century and we are surrounded by technologic devices; such as telephones, TVs, tablets and most importantly, computers. Most people benefit from these devices for knowledge, when they need information, or they follow the news from all over the world. Some people prefer playing games, and some prefer reading books online. To sum up, technology has a lot of uses for every person and every age group. Photo taken from here Since technology is very beneficial, it should be used for educational purposes in schools too. Its most useful benefit is that, technology can provide many teaching methods. For example, using slides in the classroom or playing online games related to the topic of the lesson could make the lesson more enjoyable. Whe...

Hi everyone! Today, our topic for the Instructional Technologies course is about one of the ways to make the world a better place.  The idea that I found on the Internet is planting rooftops.  Photo taken from here If you're curious about my opinions and its benefits on the environment, you can listen to my podcast by clicking the button down below. Hope you enjoy! Photo taken from here CLICK THE BUTTON Before ending my post, I want to share my thoughts about podcasting. At first I was a little bit nervous about my intonation and pronunciaton, but when I started recording, I felt relieved. Actually I really enjoyed it and I think I will be using podcasting in the future, for my students. As listening is an important method for learning a foreign language, I think podcasting could be beneficial for listening activities. And no, I didn't find it difficult, it took 10 minutes or so for me to finish it. I highly recommend everyone podcasti...

Computer-assisted language learning, shortly CALL, is used and still being used for more than 50 years. It is a kind of a new way of learning a foreign language, thanks to developing technology. It has three steps. First of them is Structural CALL , which can be called as Behaviorist CALL too. It was widespread in 1960s and 1970s. Repeated exposure to the same material was believed to be beneficial or even essential to learning. Also the computer was used as a tutor.  (Timeline Created with Microsoft PowerPoint) Photo taken from here The second one is Communicative (or Cognitive) CALL . It was common between 1980s and 1990s in the language classrooms. Grammar was taught implicitly. Computers were used to stimulate discussion, writing or critical thinking. And the final one is Integrative (also known as Sociocognitive or Socioconstructive) CALL . It has been used since 90s. It facilitates a principle focus on the content. Also language learners can communicate ...

As technology evolves, the education systems change. Learning is not as difficult or temporary as it was in the older eras. Classes used to be just teacher-centered. Teachers would lecture all day, teach their students only grammar. Students would participate in the lessons seldomly and their speaking skills were not advanced. Textbooks were the only source they benefited from. Students did their homework just to get a high grade. But in the  21 st  century things have changed. Technology has become a part of education. Computers, slides, videos, applications and online games help students to learn the lessons more easily. Photo taken from here Classes are student-centered now. Students can freely express their ideas, participate in the lessons. They create new things, not just sit in the classroom and listen to the lesson. Another point is, the lessons are not all about grammar nowadays. Students are aware of the important topics, such as global warming, ...

Hello everyone, welcome to my blog. I am Eda and I am 20. I study ELT in Marmara University.  I created this blog for my Instructional Technologies and Materials Design course. I will be sharing many posts, podcasts, posters, etc. about the benefits of technology in language learning, here on my blog. I hope you like it! Photo taken from here